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Austin MotoGP Results

Marc Marquez dominated the entire weekend at the Austin track, ultimately taking the race win ahead of Honda teammate Dani Pedrosa. Finishing third, quite a ways back, was Ducati’s Andrea Dovizioso. The Repsol Hondas were on another level today compared with the competition. Yamaha’s Jorge Lorenzo continued with his bad luck that began with a DNF at Qatar. Lorenzo jumped the start badly, and was penalized with a slow ride through pit lane. He rejoined the race and ultimately finished in tenth position, a remarkable result given the circumstances.

Marquez has the points lead after winning each of the first two races. For additional details, results and points visit the official MotoGP site.

41 Comments

Drove 2500 miles round trip, N. Utah to Austin, Main Grandstand, ~70′ from Row 1. Regardless MMs dominance, this was the most exciting race I attended. By comparison Laguna Seca is a pit.

The experience of the start at such range resulted in me and the Asian guy next to me just staring at each other shaking our heads. MM flying up the longest straight way over 200mph toward turn 1 hairpin (elevation 150′) is a world class memory.

Even General Admission has countless spectacular views. Austin must be one of the best tracks in the world. Nothing but raves from everyone with whom I talked. I can not more highly recommend visiting this track.

As reported, Moto3 is incredible, a huge thrill and perfect lead in to MotoGP. Hats off to whoever dreamed up Moto3. Even Moto2 is great (about as fast as I’d personally want to go).

Picture taken with Kevin Schwantz Saturday signing autographs with Roger Hayden at the Suzuki booth. Kevin’s assistant Marnie is a gem. So glad the court battle is history.

What a trip! I’ll likely do it again next year. You won’t regret the effort, whatever it takes.

As I’ve mentioned before, I like to see the go-fast machinery too. Close racing can be exciting but I find it exciting also when a team gets it right and literally smokes the field. I like to give a hand to all the engineers and technicians behind the scenes who have worked hard to push the envelope. I wouldn’t want a one rider/bike season, and few are, but I truly enjoy seeing all things going right and they just explode away from the pack.

We were hoping the tires were going to be put together to suit the Yamaha, but it didn’t happen. Same thing happened to Spies a couple years ago at Assen when chunks of tire fell off the back of his bike and it was the fault of Spies…
Hope Lin doesn’t make an ultimatum to Jorge? Of course that would never happen.

MM is on fire, but I’m sure JL and VR will make it entertaining at least in Italy, that’s a good Yamaha track for the past decade or so when Stoner wasn’t riding.

To everyone who is saying Marquez already has this year sewn up after only two races, I would advise a bit of caution. The Yamahas have not had a proper chance to prove themselves, and Marquez may yet suffer a mishap or two of his own. In Qatar Rossi was right there with MM, and Jorge crashed before we had a chance to see what he could do. In CotA MM benefitted from a freakish tire issue on Rossi’s bike, and an even more freakish screw-up by Jorge. Point being, sure, Marquez has clearly checked out on his teammate and everyone else in the series, but the Yamahas have not yet been fully able to show their hand. I could be wrong, but I firmly believe both factory Yamahas would have been ahead of Dani yesterday under normal circumstances. How close to MM would they have gotten? Can’t say, but I’m thinking one or both of them would have at least put more pressure on him than Dani did.

And we haven’t gotten to the “Yamaha tracks” yet. CotA is clearly a Honda track, as is Qatar. Also, when MM crashes this year, will he again escape injury?

Before all is said and done, Jorge will definitely be heard from, and Rossi seems consistently strong now. Let’s let it play out.

Your’er right, it is too early to crown the kid but you have to admit he looks tough. Like the announcers said several times, the only one who can beat Marquez is Marquez. Well, that or really bad luck.

As far as Lorenzo, like several folks said below, Mr. Marquez seems to have a rent free dwelling in Lorenzo’s head. The normally cool Mr. Lorenzo has screwed up big time twice in two races. Unfortunately, these things only build on themselves. He has 6 points while the kid has 50. Makes me think of what Rossi did to Gibernau about ten years ago. I have a huge amount of respect for Lorenzo as a rider but if he doesn’t get his head right he will not be a factor this year.

Again, you are right, any rider can be beat in any race. But keep in mind Marquez was in a new world last season. He also had such a commanding lead he clearly backed off in the second half of the season. That made Lorenzo’s win count slightly less impressive. Lets also not forget Marquez scored 0 points in Australia due to a stupid rookie mistake in a stupid tire situation.

Part two: Marquez is on the steep part of his learning curve. He gets better every race. I was just reading about how he worked on his starts all winter to correct hat he saw as a weakness. Lorenzo is a seasoned pro, he doesn’t have as much room it improve.

You were right it is (far) too early to hand the championship to Marquez. However, if we check with the internet gambling sites I’m going to guess he has the best odds of winning.

I hope Lorenzo (or somebody) makes it a contest, right now it doesn’t seem likely.

Before this can become a serious race for the championship again, MM will obviously have to give back some of the points Lorenzo has already coughed up this season. It was those same points Jorge coughed up last year that handed MM an easy road to the title.

The key will be whether Marquez’s incredible good fortune continues of never getting hurt when he crashes. Though he crashed a bazillion times more than Jorge and Dani did last season, he never got hurt. We know what happened to his two rivals.

The OTHER Hondas: Nicky almost never passed anyone when he was on the Honda Factory bike. So he did not win much, which despite the championship did not win over Honda. Then he screwed himself (factory wise) going to Duc, though he did get famous, rode the limos, first class, paychecks, girls and all that. Now he is riding around for a paycheck. It’s a drag. I saw him race at Loudon back in the day. Always rooted for him. To me, THE American is now off the podium, out of the top ten and out of sight. That’s another sub story. Marquez is on an amazing machine and makes the most of it.

Ben Spies had hardly been less effusive on Friday. At the end of free practice, he, too, took the broadcast over: “I need to explain a couple of things.”

He’d already talked about his retirement and the shoulder, so what did he have on his mind? “When I was riding I was maybe in the top six in the world, maybe towards the top on a good day.” No arguing with that. “If Jorge or Valentino went past I could look and see what they were doing, maybe see they were a little smoother than me, but I understood.

“When Casey Stoner or Marc Marquez went past, I had no idea how they could do that stuff.”

IIRC He finished 13th at Cota with chest pains and crashed during practice at Indy and didn’t race. Doubt he ever saw MM during the Texas race since MM had pole and went on to win. Maybe he’s talking about following him around in practice.

It’s been boring for a long time now. I’m not a Rossi fan per se, but it was more interesting when he was racing against Giibernau, Biaggi and Capirossi. It’s a really dull thing to watch a race, but always interesting to read about the technology and politics. Not a great sport, then.

“Yamaha’s Jorge Lorenzo continued with his bad luck that began with a DNF at Qatar.”

Bad luck? He crashed in Qatar pushing to hard on a cold tire and then committed the worst jump start I’ve ever seen at COTA. How is that “bad luck?” Lorenzo admitted himself that he screwed up in both cases and apologized to his team. Seems to me that Lorenzo knows he’s not as quick as Marquez and the Honda’s so he pushing to hard…

Those Repsol Hondas are so dominant this year. Nobody challenged them. Can’t help but wonder what things would look like without the last minute rule-tweaking. Not saying that to take anything away from Marquez – he is clearly from another planet and would probably still be in the #1 spot. But maybe he would have to work for it.

Yes, and in all fairness, he did indeed look like he was working for it the whole time even though he was in a race of his own. He never let up one bit. Every lap, he pulled further and further away from everyone else.

MM has planted a worm in JLO’s head and is sure isn’t pretty. I think it speaks volumes that MM can laugh at his last corner mistake. Super Chief is a pretty damned good announcer and I like his approach to analyzing differing situations.

It’s always refreshing to see someone who doesn’t take everything so seriously.. MM seems pretty laid back, like a younger version of Rossi.

Rossi used to just walk away from the pack as well, like Marc is now… Almost like nobody has told the young lad, “you can not go that fast”. So he just goes that fast! Rossi had a bad front tire (word don the street) and before it went away he was running pretty good. Still might not have caught Pedrosa, or MM, but it was good to see Rossi on the boil again!

“Whichever one of you jokers said Marquez look like a cross between the joker and carol Channing..that’s all I can think of when he is being interviewd. Can’t even hear what he is saying. Thanks a lot!”

Should have known it was you VLJ. I swear they started interviewing him, I looked right at his mouth and that was it, never heard a word.. Just though he does look like the Joker..and maybe a little carol channing thrown in lol

Honda has enjoyed the advantage of pretty much defining the rules for the past 10 or so years and making sure nobody could compete on equal footing from a budgetary standpoint (see 12 bike grids 2 years ago..). I’m sure Ducati would trade that for 4 liters of fuel (that they may or may not have used in the race).